Former Rutgers coach Kevin Bannon weighs in on scandal

Rutgers coach Kevin Bannon concentrates on the game during the second half against Miami in Piscataway, N.J., Saturday, Feb. 5, 2000. Miami defeated Rutgers 58-52. A judge dismissed a lawsuit by two former Rutgers basketball players and a team manager who said they were humiliated when Bannon forced them to run naked during practice. (AP Photo/Daniel Hulshizer)

Former Rutgers men’s basketball coach Kevin Bannon knows all too well what it feels like to face the firing squad of the press.

He was terminated from the university in 2001, during the fourth year of his seven-year contract, after a media frenzy ensued in regards to a strip free-throw shooting contest held under his watch.

“It’s certainly a lonely place to be,” Bannon said Thursday. “Things can pile up extremely quickly and you find out who your friends are during times like that.”

Fast forward to present day.

The same university, another Scarlet Knights’ men’s basketball coach canned for misconduct and the media firestorm is back.

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This time around Rutgers’ coach Mike Rice was fired Wednesday after a video surfaced of him screaming gay slurs and being physically abusive towards his players.

Speaking from a basketball fan’s opinion, Bannon said the call to get rid of Rice was correct.

“Like everyone else, I was blown away by the tape,” said Bannon, who has more than two decades of college coaching experience under his belt. “I just know that I’ve never seen anything like that myself and I’ve seen a lot coached at all three levels: Division III, mid-major and Big East. When people make the comment that it goes on everywhere, I don’t agree with that.”

But Bannon is willing to defend Rutgers athletic director Tim Pernetti, who the media has turned its focus on for not doing enough after reviewing the tape. Pernetti handed Rice a three-game suspension, fined him $75,000 and required the coach to attend anger management classes.

“I think Tim Pernetti has been really a breath of fresh air for the university,” Bannon said. “I think he’s done great things and he should be supported. From everything that I see, he went about things the right way and he took the advice of legal counsel and he followed their lead.”

Bannon is hoping Pernetti can survive the onslaught.

“Maybe somebody should just step in and not allow all the piling on that the media is doing right now,” he said. “Everybody always has to have somebody’s head.”

When Bannon became the center of attention after a lawsuit was filed in 1999 by two players and a manager for the naked windsprints incident, which occurred two years earlier, he said inaccuracies of the event were reported.

Most notably, that he forced the men to participate.

“It’s frustrating that even to this day, almost 15 years from when a 10-minute incident happened, how many facts people get wrong about the whole situation,” he said. “Nobody was forced to do anything.”

The lawsuit was eventually dismissed.

The former coach also said he really wasn’t fired as a result of the incident.

“There’s no evidence that I violated any terms of my contract,” he said. “I was fired without cause, which means that Rutgers honored my contract.”

Bannon has since moved on from coaching college basketball.

For the last 10 years, he has been the executive director for the Mercer County Parks Commission.

He has dabbled with some basketball activities, such as being the head coach for the Notre Dame boy’s high school basketball team for a brief stint. He also does radio commentary for Rider University, where he used to coach, in addition to some TV work for Comcast.

“I think the good thing for me was that I had been in it for 22 years,” Bannon said of coaching. “I was anxious to see what else was out there.”

Bannon wishes the best for Rice and Pernetti in the wake of the video controversy.

“I think coach Rice I hope someday down the road he gets another chance,” he said. “I hope Tim Pernetti is able to continue to do the great things that he is doing with their athletic department.”